"There--I'll tell the mater you said awfully!" Avice jeered. "Who bites
our heads off for using slang, I'd like to know?"

"You wouldn't have much head left if I bit for every slang word you
use," retorted her half-sister. "Do get on with your French, Avice--it's
nearly half-past twelve, and you know Eliza will want to lay the table
presently. Come here, Queenie." She took the pillow case, and unpicked
a few stitches, which clearly indicated that the needle had been taking
giant strides. "Just hem that last inch or two again, and see if you
can't make it look nice. I believe the needle only stuck into your
finger because you were making it sew so badly. Have you got a
handkerchief?--but, of course, you haven't." She polished the fat,
tear-stained cheek with her own. "Now run and sit down again."

Queenie turned to go obediently enough--she was too young, and possibly
too fat, to plan, as yet, the deliberate malice in which her brother and
sister took their chief pleasure. Unfortunately, Wilfred arrived at the
end of Africa at the wrong moment for her. He pushed the atlas away from
him with a jerk that overturned the ink bottle, sending a stream of ink
towards Avice--who, shoving her chair backwards to escape the deluge,
cannoned into Queenie, and brought her headlong to the floor. Howls
broke out anew, mingled with a crisp interchange of abuse between the
elder pair, while Cecilia vainly sought to lessen the inky flood with a
duster. Upon this pleasant scene the door opened sharply.

"A nice way you keep order at lessons," said Mrs. Mark Rainham acidly.
"And the ink all over the cloth. Well, all I can say is, you'll pay for
a new one, Cecilia."